OF FOREST-TREES. 



151 



discourse how it should possibly be, all trees being held to receive their CHAP. Vli. 

 nutrition between the wood and the bark, and to perish upon their ''"^'V'"^ 

 separation ; this tree being likewise hollow as a drum, and its outmost 

 surface, when decorticated, dry and dead. The solution of this 

 phsenomenon (to all appearance, from the verdant head,) could not have 

 been more philosophically resolved, than by the hypothesis there produced 



it may reach the pistilhim : for it is not clear what use the honey-juice is of in the ceconomy 

 of flowers. From what has been said, it appears, that the generation of plants is performed 

 by the genital dust of the antherae falling on the moist stigma, or female organ ; which 

 dust, by the help of the moisture, adheres and bursts, discharging its contents, the subtle 

 particles of which are absorbed by the style, into the ovarium, germen, or seed-bud. — 

 Upon the whole, I think that the flowering of plants may be truly called their generation ; 

 the ancients having with great propriety named the flower, the joy of plants. Flos gaudium 

 arborum. — Plin. 



The calyx, then, is the bed, in which the stamina and pistilla celebrate the nuptials 

 of plants ; and here, also, those tender organs ai-e cherished and defended from external 

 injuries. The corolla, or petals, are the curtains, closely surrounding the male and female 

 organs, in order to keep off storm, rain, or cold ; but when the sun shines bright, they 

 freely expand, both to give access to the sun's rays, and to the fecundating dust. The 

 filaments are the spermatic vessels by which the juice, secreted from the plant, is carried 

 to the antherae. The antherae are the testicles, and may not improperly be compared 

 to the soft roe or milt of fishes. The dust of the antherae answers to the sperm and 

 seminal animalcules ; for, though it is dry, that it may the more easily be conveyed by the 

 wind, yet it gets moisture upon touching the stigma. The stigma is that external part 

 of the female organ which receives the male dust, and on which the male dust acts. The 

 style is the vagina, or tube, through which the effluvia of the male dust pass to the germen 

 or seed-bud. The germen is the ovary, for it contains the unimpregnated or unfertilized 

 seeds. The pericarpium, or seed-vessel, answers to the impregnated ovary ; and, in fact, 

 is the same with the germen, or seed-bud, only increased in bulk, and loaded with fertile 

 seeds. The seeds are the eggs, of which we have already fully spoken. We ought to 

 observe, that the calyx is a production of the external bark of the plant; the corolla, of the 

 inner bark ; the stamina, of the alburnum, or white sap ; the pericarpium, or seed-vessel, 

 of the woody substance ; and the seeds, of the pith of the tree ; for in this manner they are 

 placed, and in this manner, also, they are unfolded. Therefore, in a flower we find all the 

 internal parts of a plant unfolded. This, though obscurely, was taken notice of by 

 Caesalpinus, and also by Mr. Logan of Philadelphia. Flowers, then, are nothing else but 

 the genitals of plants, with this difference from those of animals, that their organs of gene- 

 ration are reckoned obscene, and modesty forbids us to examine them ; for which reason 

 Nature has taken care frequently to hide them from our sight. But in the vegetable king, 

 dora it is quite otherwise ; for there those parts are not hid, but rather exposed to the view 

 of all. Add to this, that they are the most beautiful of all the parts of plants, in which the 



U 2 



